


Nothing But A Distraction

by RedOrchid



Series: Episode remixes, missing scenes and fix-its [1]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alec Lightwood is Not a Virgin, Alec Lightwood-centric, Canon Divergence, Character Study, Clary the Interloper, Episode: s01e05 Moo Shu To Go, M/M, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-09-09 04:48:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8876626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedOrchid/pseuds/RedOrchid
Summary: Clary doesn't sneak away when Alec's on the phone, so Alec accepts Magnus' invitation to "go out for a drink".





	

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little Alec-centric thing I wrote after talking headcanons with my beta one night. Because I love canon-divergent what-ifs. And because I'm convinced Alec was totally seeing quotation marks around Magnus' drink invitation in that scene and still immediately went for it. XD

Alec is still seething on the inside when he heads up to the training platform, where Clary’s waiting for him. He still can’t believe he’s stuck in the Institute—basically being a glorified babysitter for the day—while Jace and Izzy get sent on a diplomatic mission to the Seelies.

He needs to do better. Stop screwing up and make sure he keeps his head level at all times. Emotions are a distraction, Alec knows, and since Clary arrived, there have been far too many emotions flying around, muddying the waters and getting in the way of things.

He needs a break for a few hours. Ideally away from the Institute, to be able to fully clear his head.

Meanwhile, Clary just  _ keeps talking _ , asking questions and giving stupid advice about things she doesn’t know anything about and has no business poking her nose into.

Alec dodges her staff and flips her over it, knocking her to the ground, mostly to give himself a few, blessed seconds of peace and quiet.

“You need to work on your defense,” he tells her, extending a hand to pull her back up on her feet. “What do you think? That we haven’t been trying to find your mother?”

“Of course you have,” Clary replies. “But I know you can colour outside the lines. You’re just not letting yourself think that way.”

“Oh yeah? And what’s the big thought I’m not thinking?” Alec throws back, rolling his eyes at her and giving her back her staff. The frustration inside of him keeps mounting as Clary starts listing her own ideas about how to find Valentine—as though the entire Clave isn’t working tirelessly on the same thing with the help of a lot of people who are much better shadowhunters than little miss Clary Fray.

He will admit that the box she mentions might be worth looking into, though. Grudgingly.

He lowers his staff. “Where can we find it?”

“I think it’s still back at the loft,” Clary says, a proud little smile on her face, as though she just came up with something brilliant. “Let’s go get it.”

Alec is just about to tell her ‘absolutely not’—or at least not until they get official permission—when his phone rings, showing an incoming call from an unknown number.

He frowns and looks back at Clary, signaling her to wait for a moment, and then walking off a little to the side to take the call. 

“Hello? Who is this?”

“Alexander. Hi. It’s Magnus,” comes a voice on the other end of the line. “We met the other day, you know, with the demon?”

Alec quickly looks around himself and presses his phone a little closer to his ear. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, hey, what’s up?”

“I was just thinking it was really nice getting to know you,” Magnus says. “You seem… sympathetic. Would you like to go out for a drink sometime?”

The way he says ‘sympathetic’ sends a current of electricity down the full length of Alec’s spine. Magnus’ voice sounds like a promise—suggestive and playful all at once—and Alec quickly weighs his options.

On the one hand, Magnus is a downworlder, and a very prominent one at that. Alec’s always been very careful to keep his…  _ indulgences _ fully separate from his normal life—to the point where he’s convinced most of the people at the Institute still think he’s a virgin. On the other hand, Magnus has a reputation of going through partners like other people change their clothes, and that kind of love-’em-leave-’em attitude is exactly what Alec likes to look for when he needs something more than running ten miles or punching a sandbag until his arms give out to soothe the itch that gets under his skin.

In the end, it’s the memory their first meeting that tips the scale: the no-nonsense way Magnus took down his enemy, only to turn around and transform into someone who managed to be devastatingly attractive while making a truly awful pun.

Alec likes the contradiction.

“That sounds fun,” he says, already thinking through his schedule to find when he’ll have a window. “Um… When?”

“How about right now?” Magnus suggests, and Alec’s already rapid pulse kicks up another notch.

It’s a terrible idea. Everything in Alec’s life is up in the air: his parents are disappointed in him;  _ the Clave _ is disappointed in him; Jace has completely lost his head over Clary, with Izzy happily chiming in; they’re nowhere close to apprehending Valentine or getting hold of the Mortal Cup; they summoned a fucking  _ demon _ without permission from the Clave; and to top it all off, Alec is stuck babysitting Clary for the day, while everyone else is out in the field doing real work.

Actually, getting rid of some tension sounds like a great idea.

“Um… yeah, sure,” he tells Magnus, glancing over his shoulder where Clary is making annoying are-you-almost-done?-gestures at him. “Now’s good. Give me an hour.”

“Marvellous. Anywhere special you’d like to go?”

Alec frowns in confusion. “The loft’s fine.”

“Alec, come on, let’s go,” Clary whines, and Alec’s determination to get out of the Institute triples.

“Got to go. I’ll be there shortly,” he tells Magnus, and then quickly disconnects the call.

He puts the phone back in his pocket and walks back out on the training floor.

“Okay, so, listen,” he tells Clary. “I’m going to file the paperwork to get proper approval for going after that box of yours. It will come back in a couple of hours, and then—”

“A couple of hours?!” Clary exclaims. “My mom’s—”

“ _ Like I said _ , it will come back in a couple of hours,” Alec cuts her off. “And by then, Izzy and Jace will be back from talking to the Seelies and they can go with you to find it.”

“What about you?” Clary asks “Why can’t we just go right now and you can come with me? Or I can go alone. I’ll call Simon to help me look; we’ll be back before you know it.”

“Okay, look,” Alec says, taking a deep breath to keep himself calm, “I really don’t care what you want right now. My job is to run this Institute, not be at your beck and call. So you can either wait for two fucking hours and then go get the box,  _ with _ proper approval and backup, or I can lock you up in a holding cell—your choice.”

Clary glares at him, probably regretting that she didn’t just sneak off while Alec was on the phone, and Alec’s really had enough for the day. 

He leads her over to the Ops Centre and places her in the care of one of his more senior teams, goes and files the paperwork he said he would and shoots off a text to Jace and Izzy to let them know about the box and that he, himself, is going out on patrol.

Then he goes back to his room and takes a quick shower, before putting his regular patrol clothes on and getting his bow from weapons’ storage.

No one even blinks an eye as he leaves the Institute, and Alec feels excitement rise as he walks to the nearest subway entrance and gets on a train bound for Brooklyn.

By conservative estimation, he’ll have at least three hours before anyone will even think to check in with him, and about five until he goes on for his next shift.

Alec’s planning on making the most of his time.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are love! <3
> 
> I might write a companion to this at some point, because I'm equally convinced that Magnus didn’t mean anything more than just a drink at that point, so getting into his pov would be fun to write. We'll see what happens. :)


End file.
